


Canvas Goodbyes

by angsty_nerd



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Bad Wolf Bay, Gen, Really it’s all about Ten, Sort of Eleven - Freeform, because it was written before eleven’s first episode, but also kinda not, saying goodbye
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:42:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25177858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angsty_nerd/pseuds/angsty_nerd
Summary: Written for the then_theres_us ficathon in 2010.Note that this was written before S5 premiered and I stopped watching the show in S5, so probably not a great characterization.Mostly just a goodbye to Ten from Eleven’s POV.I’ll try to include the prompt below, but in case it doesn’t take, it’s a photo of a single beat up Chuck (sneaker) on the beach.





	Canvas Goodbyes

Canvas Goodbyes  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It was a few days before life slowed enough for him to stop and think about the implications of his change.   
  
Amy Pond was sleeping somewhere in the depths of his new TARDIS, and for the first time since the change he was alone. He sat in the console room, listening to the hum of his beautiful ship, just absorbing the newness of everything surrounding him. New TARDIS, new sonic screwdriver, new companion...it wasn’t just him who had changed. Everything around him had changed too.  
  
Leaning back, he tried to kick his feet up onto the rim of the console, but they fell short, and he felt ridiculous. A habit from the past that was no longer possible in this body.  
  
A stream of memories suddenly began flowing through him, causing an ache in his chest. Looking around the room, his eyes no longer lingered on a spot where Rose had one stood, laughing at him with her tongue peeking from her teeth. Martha's red jacket no longer hung over the edge of a coral arm, and the console buttons weren't the same ones that Donna pressed, struggling to learn how to fly his ship.  
  
He thought back to his final goodbyes. Martha knew he was gone. She had to know. Donna couldn't, of course, but at least Wilf lived on with the memory of his life and death. But Rose... He had said goodbye to her for himself, but it wasn't right. She didn't know that it was all over. For a moment he ached with a desire for her to know.  
  
Before he could stop himself, the Doctor was on his feet, punching coordinates into the TARDIS, and sending his ship through the Vortex, back to a place that he knew he shouldn't go.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Mere minutes later, he was squinting in the bright sunlight, listening to the sound of the waves crashing gently into the sand. The beach was cold and silent, empty of all of the cacophony of emotions which had crashed around in the air on his first visit to these shores. He knew there would be nothing here, but he couldn't help feeling disappointed. Sliding to the ground, he sat in the sand, his back up against the closed doors of the TARDIS, staring out along the shoreline.  
  
Darlig ulv Stranden. This place, Bad Wolf Bay, seemed to be the link between the universes. It was the place where the last cracks in the universe came out on Rose's side when he first lost her. It was also the only place he could go to take her back to her universe after Davros and the Daleks. He had never been to his own universe's version of Bad Wolf Bay. He had never allowed himself to hope or dream that the connection between this place and the two universes could possibly go both ways. Now, he squinted his eyes and tried to sense any deformities in the universe here.  
  
He felt nothing.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
There was sand on his boots. A light dusting of granules were sticking to the leathery surface. It looked strange. Before, in his previous life, he wore casual shoes, sneakers; the kind of shoes that people would wear out on a casual stroll on a cold beach. These new boots looked wrong in a place so intricately tied to the past. He blinked, and forced himself to look away from his boots.  
  
 _Were_ there any cracks in the universe here? Nothing seemed out of place. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his sonic, quickly scanning the beach for signs of anything unnatural. The scans came back normal. He narrowed his eyes at the sonic, annoyed with it, even though he knew that the possibility of finding anything was slim.   
  
The sand fell free of his boots, as he pushed himself to his feet, and turned, hurrying back inside the TARDIS.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
“Ow!” His hand stung after slamming it into the console in frustration. He reminded himself to remember not to do that anymore. The TARDIS scanners, more intricate than the readings from his sonic screwdriver, also registered nothing unusual on the beach. He slumped against the console, trying to decide what to do next, when suddenly his mind got stuck on the image of his boots in the sand.  
  
He should forget about it. He knew it was impossible to travel between parallel universes. It was only a series of highly improbable events that had allowed Rose to end up in the other universe in the first place. The fact that she had even come back was only because of Davros. Unless there was another megalomaniac messing with the laws of reality, it was highly unlikely that even the slightest crack could possibly exist. And even if one did exist, the chances of it being at Bad Wolf Bay in this universe, a place where nothing unusual had ever happened, was a complete impossibility.  
  
So why did a part of him persist in hoping?   
  
He pushed himself into motion, running through the corridors of the TARDIS to the wardrobe room. Even though it had only been a handful of days since his change, the TARDIS had already filed away his old clothes, back into the archives of his past selves. Still, it only took a moment of searching before he found what he was looking for.  
  
One canvas sneaker. A black one.   
  
The last time he had worn this particular sneaker was Christmas on the Titanic. The first time he had worn it was with Rose, in the other universe, when they had first met the Cybermen. Which meant that there should be void stuff stuck to this shoe. It held traces of a journey through the walls of reality.  
  
He held the shoe in his hands for a while, a crooked smile on his face as he reminisced on the adventures that he had once had while wearing these shoes. It was recent history, but at the same time, it was already a lifetime ago.  
  
He took the shoe out to the console room, carefully placing it aside, before he opened up a containment bin and rustled around, looking for one last thing.  
  
“Ah ha!” he cried, as he pulled a sharpie pen free from the bin.   
  
His attention turned back to the shoe. Loosening the laces, he pulled open the canvas, exposing the dirty grey interior of the shoe. He pulled the cap off of the pen and stuck it in his mouth, before going to work.  
  
He wrote one single word on the inside of the shoe, in Gallifreyan. A single, looping image that no one would recognize. No one in this universe, that is. The only way it would ever be translated into a message is if it reached a destination in another universe; if it slipped through a crack in the walls of reality.  
  
The TARDIS door creaked as it opened for the last time on the beach. He didn’t even bother to step outside. His hand reached out, and dropped the shoe.   
  
The TARDIS dematerialized, leaving the beach empty, save for a single, worn-out shoe, with a message inside that would never reach its destination.  
  
 _Goodbye_.


End file.
